


Never Brothers

by Marf_Redux



Series: Just another Stray AU [17]
Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Breaking and Entering, M/M, former friends now at odds, mention of one sided Tim/Dick, mention of the Robin's being child soldiers, unhealthy relationship dynamics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-27
Updated: 2019-12-27
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:34:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21984490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Marf_Redux/pseuds/Marf_Redux
Summary: Dick decides to check out Tim's home for proof that he might be stray.
Series: Just another Stray AU [17]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1270859
Kudos: 35





	Never Brothers

**Author's Note:**

> Comments are disabled. I have my reasons for this and they are in my profile if you simply must know why. I tell you this so you will be forewarned in case you don't want to read fics that disable them.
> 
> Kudos are appreciated and thank you in advance to anyone who leaves them.
> 
> Age of Consent Laws are mentioned and since Gotham is often implied to be in New Jersey I went with the NJ age of consent.
> 
> This is not the healthy and happy version of Tim and Dick's relationship or the yo-yoing up and down one from the comics. This fic verse has a very broken relationship. 
> 
> The fics that took place later in this unvierse were written/posted before it.

Never Brothers

He let himself into Tim’s apartment carefully. He knew that in just a short while Tim would be coming up the stairs for the night after closing up his book shop. Which meant he didn’t have long to check out what he’d come to examine and he only had a rough idea of where it could be. Acquiring the blue prints to Tim’s building hadn’t been difficult and it was readily apparent that there was an unused bedroom in the layout of Tim’s apartment.

It was the most likely place to start so he made his way to the door on the other side the bathroom and opened it to find a small dark room. It clearly only took up a small part of the room and there was a door on the other side of it. Opening that door revealed a stack of boxes that seemed to fill the room. He examined them closely noting they were real but the very edge of the door frame and floor they were sitting on was too thick. He pulled the top box out far enough to see what looked like another box behind it but too far back to touch. That was one was probably fake and the whole thing was a sliding door. It was a pretty good way to hide a work area in this apartment. Which made his next move figuring out how to open it before Tim got up here.

He immediately scanned the room quickly realizing that there were no hidden switches which meant the visible switches and locks must form the key. It took several tries turning the regular and red lights on and off and locking and unlocking doors before he found it but he was rewarded with the hidden door releasing so he slid it and the boxes resting on it aside and stepped into Tim’s work space.

Tim’s new spoiler suit was in the far corner the cape and hood were black with purple edges and the suit underneath was done in a mix of purple and black. He made his way over and began to examine it. He’d never touched Stray’s suit but he’d seen it up close so he wanted to see if Tim had reused design elements from it in his new suit. He was a bit disappointed, that the only similarities he could see were standard on all costumes in their line of work. “Find what your looking for?’ Tim’s voice said from behind him.

“You’ve used less armor on this one,” he said turning toward Tim. “I suppose the cape makes up for it though since you didn’t have one on your other costume.” He saw Tim scowl. “Well aren’t you going to try denying it?”

“What’s the point you were always going to side with Bruce and assume he’s right,” Tim said the scowl evaporating as he leaned against the wall. “I have to admit I’m kind of disappointed you broke in dressed in civvies I was expecting the full Nightwing package.” He didn’t quiet like the way Tim was looking at him so he took a look around the room.

“You’ve been busy,” he said heading over to a work area covered in files. He glanced down and recognized a name. “I remember that case Bruce was obsessed with it until...” He trailed off as he recalled the matter that had led to Bruce leaving it alone.

“The Joker showed up with a plot to turn a toy store into a puppet show using children as puppets,” Tim said with a frown. “That made the news even in Rio,” there was a strange edge to Tim’s voice. “Most of the cases I’m working are the ones that fell through the cracks when bigger problems took Bruce’s attention away.”

He carefully flipped through the file and saw that Tim had solved it already, “So I guess you’ll be paying the murderer a visit?” It would give him a chance to see how Tim moved in his new suit up close.

“No, he’s in jail on an unrelated charge,” Tim said with a shrug. “I’ll just drop the necessary information in a letter to the officer in charge and they can wrap it up.” He could understand that though Bruce preferred sending it straight to Gordan to make sure it was actually done. Gotham cops sometimes objected to vigilante’s solving things for them. “Anyway now that you’ve seen my work space and convinced yourself Bruce is right why don’t you get the hell out,” Tim’s sneer from earlier was back.

“Don’t play like your offended,” he said letting his annoyance show. “You’ve given us no reason to trust you faking your death for two years after being one of us.” He really didn’t like the look in Tim’s eyes then so he went on, “hell you were like my little brother and you let us mourn you, so why shouldn’t we think you were the ass hole playing with us.”

Tim actually laughed and it was unnerving to hear, “True you’ve got plenty of reason to think I’d want to fuck with you,” something about the way Tim framed that made him wary. “But nice job rationalizing things and leaving out the part where I got thrown away by you and Bruce for a mistake that saved his life.” There was a dark edge as he went on, “I mean sure I don’t blame Bruce for firing me from being Robin because my actions did kill someone even if he was a scum bag who probably deserved worse.” Tim gave him a dark look, “I mean did you ever look up his record I did and well once I saw it I stopped losing sleep over it.”

The truth was he hadn’t looked it up as Bruce had asked him to stay out of it. The fact Tim didn’t seem the slightest bit disturbed that he’d killed someone only furthered convinced him that Bruce was right about Tim. “That’s not exactly making me trust you.”

“To be blunt Dick, I don’t give a damn if you trust me or not,” Tim said darkly. “And frankly we were never brothers and it isn’t like I ever wanted to be your brother anyway.” Tim gave him a strange look. “Since we are airing dirty laundry should I bring up the fact we both know I was totally head over heels in love with you back then and how fucked it was that you’d occasionally use me for an ego boost but kept your distance if I looked like I might attempt to make a move.”

“I never used you as an ego boost,” he said without denying that knew Tim had crush on him. There was no point it had been blatantly obvious. “I just set healthy limits on how I’d interact with you.” Sure there were times he’d felt flattered but he’d never encouraged Tim.

“Healthy limits is pushing it coming from the guy that took a fourteen year old blindfolded train surfing,” Tim said with a smirk. “You know I used to lay awake at night jerking off to fantasies of you returning my feelings once I was sixteen and legal.” He started to laugh, “imagine the child soldier in a vigilante’s war on crime thinking he needed to follow age of consent laws instead of all the other laws I regularly broke.” Tim said pausing briefly before continuing, “The worst part is even now knowing how well your name fits you I’d still jump at the chance to have one night with you.”

So Tim just insulted him and made a pass at him. “I don’t think that will be happening,” he said deciding not to even bother being gentle. “Even if I wasn’t convinced you were a threat your not my type.”

“Oh I already know that, I’m not a red head or old enough for you to work out your daddy issues with,” Tim said with a cruel smirk. “So now that we’ve made it quiet clear how little we think of each other these days, you can get the hell out of my house or I’m calling the cops secret identities being exposed or not.”

Tim turned and let the room and he followed and was surprised to see Tim picking up his cell phone. “Last Chance, asshole,” he decided not to call Tim’s bluff and made his way back over to the door to the steps leading to the alley. “Don’t come back unless you change your mind about the one night stand.”

As he made his way back to where he’d left his car he wondered how much of that had been genuine and how much of it was Tim just fucking with him again. He still didn’t have any proof but he was more convinced than ever that Tim was Stray. The daddy issues comment eliminated all doubt as far as he was concerned.

He hadn’t even gotten into his car when his phone rang and a glance showed it was Bruce so he answered. “I just saw him, and I think your right but I don’t have proof.” He heard Bruce’s snort of disgust at the lack of proof before he hung up. He knew he should be angry at being dismissed like that but in truth he was just tired. It would probably be better if he went back to Bludhaven and let Bruce handle the Tim situation. He still missed the kid he’d thought Tim was and seeing what he’d become was too heartbreaking. A small part of him was also afraid that their might be some truth in Tim’s claims of how they’d abandoned him. 

The end.


End file.
